Octaviar Liquidators referred to committee

Octaviar
Octaviar liquidator Kate Barnet.
Octaviar liquidator Bill Fletcher.

Octaviar liquidators Kate Barnett and Bill Fletcher have been referred to a disciplinary committee under section two of the Insolvency Practice Schedule by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC).

Following the issuing of a show cause notice, the corporate regulator published notice of the referral to a schedule two committee last week.

Barnett declined to comment when contacted and iNO was unable to make contact with Fletcher.

The company was a tourism, property and finance play that fell foul of its own frailties during the global financial crisis.

The pair were appointed liquidators of Octaviar Administration and Octaviar Limited by the courts in September 2009, replacing Deloitte’s John Grieg and Nick Harwood who’d been appointed liquidators via a resolution of creditors two months earlier.

The then Bentleys pair took charge of an $80 million war chest which they’ve since utilised to pursue unfair preference payments, sometimes successfully and often at enormous cost.

Whilst ASIC has provided no detail in respect of the show cause notice’s contents, iNO reported in 2013 on proceedings in which a judge criticised what he described a the Barnett and Fletcher’s “lack of candour”. Support INO’s continued chronicling of the insolvency sector.

Further reading:

Uninvited Crash Octaviar’s Ex-Parte

ASIC Notice

6 Comments on "Octaviar Liquidators referred to committee"

  1. Shirley Dale | 22 July 2020 at 1:33 pm | Reply

    Wow a liquidator with $80m, no wonder they ran it for almost 10 years, and like a few other firm of insolvency practitioners, built up an empire from the cash flow!
    I understand that empire has recently split. Perhaps the $$$ ran out?

  2. ASIC acting in a timely manner as usual…

  3. Liquidators can’t do any right it seems. We try to help out but we get pinged time and time again. We are fearless and have no favour, yet get treated like pooh!

  4. The issues at play here are highly complex and it is important that nothing be intimated to suggest wrongdoing by the practitioners involved. The ASIC’s investigations are in progress and a final position is yet to be taken by it.

    • Dear SB, are you certain ASIC’s investigation is continuing? I would’ve thought the referral to the committee would not be made until the investigation was concluded but perhaps you are more familiar with how these matters tend to proceed?

  5. Will these two retain their ARITA positions?

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